infoTECH Feature

What Effect Does Cloud Computing Have on Security?

According to a recent report published by the IDC (News - Alert), public cloud services will account for nearly $40 billion in spending in 2012 and this number will grow dramatically to almost $100 billion by 2016. Many companies are increasingly turning to the cloud due to the many advantages it can offer a business in any vertical, such as increased efficiency and flexibility, reduced costs and enhanced scalability.

In its findings, the company also highlighted several technologies that are helping this growth to continue which include: basic storage, servicers, applications, system infrastructure and PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service).

Rodrigue Ullens (News - Alert), CEO of Voxbone, recently told TMCnet, “Cloud computing has been around for more than a decade. In the last 10-plus years, technologies in this domain have evolved and security mechanisms have been hardened. IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) and SaaS (News - Alert) (software-as-a-service) providers have listened to the security concerns of their prospects and customers, and have put special emphasis on responding to these requirements. In my opinion, the security of cloud infrastructure and applications is at least as good as the security of internally managed platforms. However, this does not mean that implementing security measures is simple when migrating to the cloud. Integrating an internal directory with a cloud directory for SaaS through proper identity management is still a challenging task."

As more organizations realize the success they can see when leveraging the cloud, Voxbone (News - Alert) is right there to provide full IP access to local telephone networks for cloud communications service providers that keep enterprises protected at all times.

Ullens said, “We have approximately 200 hosted PBX (News - Alert) service providers as customers. In terms of revenue and number of customers, they are by far the fastest-growing category of Voxbond customers. This confirms to me that mainstream adoption has started."

The cloud remains a huge buzzword in the IT industry and it’s crucial that thought leaders remain mindful that although ultimately everyone wants to cut costs and ramp up efficiency, business cases are completely different depending on whether you’re considering IaaS or SaaS. Whether or not SaaS will help your business depends on several factors: the level of customization the application requires (the less customized the application, the more interesting SaaS will be); the number of users (the fewer users, the more attractive); the proximity of the application to the core business (the closer, the less interesting); and the importance of high availability (the more important, the more relevant), according to Ullens.

With the interest in everything cloud growing by the day, it is also important to note that consumer and enterprise public clouds boast many differences. In fact, Ullens believes that they are two entirely separate domains, although they may meet on mobile phones as those are often used for both private and business purposes.

In addition, a large array of collaboration tools and unified communications work great when hosted in the cloud.

He added, “And they usually require very little customization but high availability. The latter is one of the key attributes of the cloud: through hardware virtualization, geographical redundancy and standard SLAs, customers usually get greater availability than with an internally hosted application. Moreover, communications applications are ‘support’ applications, not directly linked to the core business of a company. Therefore, outsourcing these applications enables companies to commit more of their still-scarce IT resources to applications with a direct impact on P&L,” Ullens stated.

Voxbone knows exactly how the cloud can benefit companies all over the world, and happens to be this year’s Platinum Sponsor of Cloud Communications Expo, a not-to-miss event that brings together the largest audience of robust communications service providers together in one place. It is an ideal opportunity for businesses to present services to the community and to take the pulse of the market and find out what’s new, which in turn can be used to anticipate customer needs now and in the future.

“At the event, we will be able to give customers and prospects a sneak peek at a new service, planned for launch later in the fourth quarter, that will be of high interest to cloud PBX and hosted IP telephony service providers. In addition, we will be holding a networking event in a fancy rooftop bar close to the venue,” he concluded.

Voxbone is a Platinum sponsor of ITEXPO West 2012, an event to be held Oct. 2-5 at the Austin Convention Center. Be sure to visit Voxbone in booth # 613.